Sharon (2019 character)

Sharon is a debt collector who worked for the late Rick Neelan.

In April 2019, Sharon was partnered with Gary Windass - who was planning to pay off the debt he owned to Rick by working for him as a debt collector. However, on their first job Gary turned on Sharon (after she began knocking Vicky Jefferies about) and locked her in a cupboard. Gary held Sharon off long enough for Vicky to escape, before he too fled. Sharon soon reported back to Rick, who beat Gary up as punishment and informed him that Vicky's debt had now become his. Later, Sharon accompanied Rick to Coronation Street where the pair took all of Gary's tools from the builder's yard he managed - and forced him to sign over his van too, in order to clear the debt.

At the end of the month, Sharon helped to intimidate Brian Packham and Cathy Matthews when they turned up at Croesus Properties in order to pay off Alex Warner's debt. While Sharon counted their money, Rick refused to cancel Alex's debt - warning the pair that he had Alex's passport. Luckily, Gary informed Rick that he had taken Alex's passport back having grabbed it while being beaten up days earlier.

Not long after Leanne Battersby began to suspect that her partner Nick Tilsley was involved with Rick, as he had come into possession of a large sum of money which he had stolen from his grandmother Audrey Roberts, and attempted to get some information about the loan shark from Gary's fiance - and Nick's sister - Sarah Platt. Unfortunately, Sarah was completely in the dark about Gary's dodgy dealing so Leanne and Toyah Battersby planned to search Rick's office - although Sarah refused to get involved. The Battersby sisters were able to get Rick out of his office by pretending to be a client and, while searching his office, they were able to locate Rick's box of passports which he had taken from his cilents. Leanne was relieved that Nick's passport was not part of Rick's collection but, as the pair planned to leave, they found themselves trapped in the office by Sharon.

Just before Sharon was able to get into the office and expose their investigation, Sarah turned up and knocked her unconscious. The trio fled, taking the box of passports with them. When Rick returned he demanded an explanation from Sharon but she was unable to give him anything except for the fact that one of the girls had yelled out Sarah's name. Rick immediately recognised Sarah's name as that of Gary's girlfriend and suspected him of the break-in. As a result of this Sharon assisted Rick in kidnapping Gary, but she later had a change of heart and left when she discovered that Rick was planning to kill Gary. Believing that he was dying, Gary left a message on Sarah's phone and admitted to causing the Underworld roof collapse which killed Rana Habeeb.

However, Rick was forced to flee moments before ending Gary's life after Sharon contacted the authorities and Gary located Sarah's phone (which had been taken by an emotionally unwell Carla Connor) to delete the message he had left. The following month Rick and Gary had yet another confrontation - although this one ended in Gary murdering Rick in self defence. Later, Gary reluctantly took over Rick's office and began working as a loan shark himself. When Sharon learned about this she began to suspect that Gary had done something to Rick, and paid him a visit to question him and reveal that Rick's daughter Kelly had already reported him missing to the police and informed them that Gary had taken over his office in her father's absence.